Marcus Buckingham, co-author of the best-selling Gallup book, Now, Discover Your Strengths, just released his new book, StandOut: The Groundbreaking New Strengths Assessment from the Leader of the Strengths Revolution.  His take is that the most successful and fulfilled people are those who spend more time developing their strengths than they do trying to fix their weaknesses.  He also says that companies who encourage employees to focus on their strengths are more likely to thrive.

There’s one portion of a recent interview that might be of interest to high school students considering what to study in college.   At the 8:50 point of this podcast, he tackles the question, “Do strengths change over time?  If I’m strong on something when I’m 15, am I going to be strong on the same thing when I’m 35 or 45?”

His answer:

Your personality doesn’t change much over the course of your life.  If you’re ordered and structured at 15, you’re going to be ordered and structured at 35.  If you have a natural feeling of empathy at 15, you’re going to have an insane sense of other peoples’ emotions at 35.   What changes of course are two things—your skills, so you can change what you know how to do, how to apply that empathy or structure.   And you can change your experience.   So the experience in the form of your values, those will of course change throughout the course of your life.  And you change your perspective on yourself, so the experience you get in living with your empathy and understanding how that works for you…So the things that change in the course of your life are experience and skills.  Your natural recurring patterns of thought or feeling or behavior or emotion, those things don’t change.

Many high school students feel pressure to pick a college major that ties directly to a future career, like accounting, journalism or engineering.  But while strengths stay the same, the skills and experiences you will have change.  That means that if you love the order and precision of math and it’s always been your best subject, you’ll probably always enjoy that type of thinking.  But it doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll love being an accountant at 35 or 45.  You might consider picking a college and major that helps you develop the strength without limiting yourself to one career.  It's the difference between majoring in math and majoring in accounting.     

I'm not against pre-professional majors and they are the right choice for some students.  But please remember that if you're planning on going to college, you don't necessarily need to identify your future career first.  

Two economics professors at the University of Chicago have co-written a paper that gives scientific basis to something counselors know but students and parents forget—achievement tests don’t measure what’s really going to matter once a student gets out in the real world.

When it comes to the standardized tests associated with college admissions, yes, they can impact your admissibility at some schools. I’ve got no problem with a student doing smart preparation to raise scores and potentially add even more college options.  But remember that these tests are never the most important thing to colleges, and they mean almost nothing to the rest of the world once you go to college. You never meet a person who’s a failure in life because of low SAT or ACT scores earned back in high school.

If you’ve ever vented your anger at someone over email and later regretted sending it, next time, take a page from Abraham Lincoln’s book.  As author Doris Kearns Goodwin described in an NPR interview,

“When he (Lincoln) was upset with somebody, he would write what he called a ‘hot letter,’ where he would write it all down. He would put it aside until his emotions cooled down and then write ‘never sent, never signed.'”

Anger often subsides.  But writing makes it permanent.  Give yourself a day or two to cool down.  And if you’re still angry, you can still send the email.  Warren Buffett once said, “You can always tell a guy to go to hell tomorrow.  You don’t give up that opportunity.”

At one point in the winding airport security line this morning, I made the turn and found there were three different directions I could go—left, right or straight.  Wth no clear indication which was the right route, I picked one, only to have one of the agents yell, “Sir! This way!” and point the opposite direction. I then watched this cycle repeat itself with traveler after traveler for 15 minutes. Confused travelers would pick a direction. If they chose wrong, they got yelled at.

That system this morning was broken. Yet not one of the multiple agents on hand thought to actually fix the problem. One of them could have easily reconfigured the barriers or even just stood at the spot of confusion to direct people. One person, someone who cared enough to fix it, could have made that problem go away.

If you want to become instantly more valuable to a group, team, employer or organization, be a fixer. If something isn’t working, be smart and do something about it.  If it’s not your job to fix it, fix it anyway. Don’t just watch (or yell).

Kelly McGonigal is a Stanford psychologist who argues that stress may only be bad for you if you believe that it’s bad for you.  A better way to think of a stressful feeling is, “This is my body’s way of rising to a challenge.”  If you reframe your stress perspective, your body will believe you, and your response to the stress will be that much better.

If she’s right, think how that might help you perform better on an important test, in a presentation, or even during the big game.  When you feel that sense of stress come over you, take that feeling as a good thing.   It’s a sign that your body and mind are ready for action.   Her 15-minute TED Talk is worth viewing, especially if you feel like stress gets in your way of performing.

According to Brad Stone, author of The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon, here’s how Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, once described himself: 

“Physically, I’m a chicken.  Mentally, I’m bold.”

It’s not just a funny turn of phrase.  Bezos manages to seem likeable in just one sentence (even though the rest of the book shares many examples of what it’s like to work for Bezos that make him less likeable).

For seniors applying to college (for all of us, really), don’t be afraid to acknowledge your own weaknesses, whatever they may be.  You're human.  We all have faults.  Pointing them out shows a lot of self-awareness and confidence.  And it gives you more credibility when you’re touting a strength.

On a college application, it’s the difference between:

"I’m a good leader and I can inspire people.”

and…

“Organizationally, I’m a disaster.  But I’m a good leader and I can inspire people.” 

See the difference?